The Greek's Long-Lost Son

In shock Theo had lunged for him, but he had been beaten up by hired thugs and left for dead on the island of Salamis. After he had recovered from his injuries he’d looked everywhere for Stella, but no one had seen her. She didn’t answer his calls or letters. She’d simply vanished.

Eventually he came to the conclusion that she really didn’t want to see him again. It was evident her family had talked her into getting rid of the baby. His baby.

He shifted his weight. “I’ve been waiting all day for your call so we could discuss Ari. When I didn’t hear from you, I decided to phone you. Where and how would you like my first meeting with him to take place?”

“I’d rather it never happened in this lifetime or the next.”

A nerve throbbed at the corner of his mouth. “Then you’re saying you want this handled through the court?’

“No,” she blurted in agony. For a moment she reminded him of the vulnerable girl he had once known. “I have to know what you plan to do. Ari keeps a lot of things to himself. Naturally he’s frightened about things.”

“So am I,” his voice grated. “Do you have a sense of how he truly feels?”

A groan escaped her throat. “I wish I could tell you he despises the idea of you and would prefer you didn’t exist, but the truth is, I have no idea how he feels deep inside.”

In other words, Ari knew his mother hated Theo.

“Today he was probably reacting the way he did to please me. He always tries to please,” she explained. “Maybe more than is healthy at times.”

He had little doubt that Ari hated the man who’d fathered him and then had promptly rejected him even before he was born. A six-year-old could hate just as vehemently as a fiftyor an eighty year-old. Theo was under no illusion that this would be easy. In this case the hatred would be worse because Ari would have been indoctrinated by his uncles who’d wished Theo dead long ago.

He realized he needed to be prepared for hostility from Ari that might last a lifetime. A lot of factors would enter in, beginning with the atmosphere in which Ari had been raised, the amount of hate built up against Theo on the part of Stella’s family. Her parents had been against him from the beginning.

Taking into account that the Athas brothers considered Theo the underbelly of Greek society and had done everything short of killing him to keep him away from Stella, Theo was starting off with an enormous minus handicap.

“Thank you for that much honesty, Stella.” He hadn’t expected it. “Since I already love him more than life itself and know you do, too, let’s meet somewhere this evening to discuss him. A public place or not, whatever you prefer. Can you arrange for someone to watch him while we’re together?”

“Of course, but it’s not possible. I’m on Andros right now.”

In other words, she assumed he was in Athens and that any plans he had for tonight were out of the question. He had news for her. “I can be there in an hour. Just tell me where you’ll be exactly.”

He counted a full minute while she was forced to realize he had a helicopter at his disposal. That put him in the same league with the way her family moved around. “There’s a paddleboat concession on the beach in Batsi. I’ll wait for you there in the parking lot at seven-thirty.”

She clicked off before he could say thank you, but it didn’t matter. Progress had been made. The gods had been with him today.

He checked his watch. It was six-thirty. After phoning the pilot to give him their next destination, he rang the manager to say goodbye, then headed for the helipad with Boris.

Theo had never been to Andros, but Stella had told him so much about it, he felt like he knew its special places by heart. Certainly his son, young as he was, could probably show Theo around and know what he was talking about.

Andros was the home of the legendary Stasio Athas, where some of the most elite Greek families lived. To the people in Theo’s family it represented lala land. A smile broke one corner of his mouth. This Pantheras member was about to trespass on ground not meant for untouchables.

Stella’s elite family viewed other families like Theo’s, who lived close to the poverty line, at the bottom of the food chain. When Theo had refused the money Nikos had thrust at him to stay away from Stella, Nikos had snarled words like scum and untouchable among the many insults hurled at him. Nice people, Stella’s family.

He looked out the window. Summer had come to the Cyclades. As Andros came into view, his breath caught at the lush green island dotted with flowers. No wonder Stella loved it here. St. Thomas was idyllic, but it didn’t compare in the same way.

After the helicopter had dropped down over the little port of Batsi, his gaze swerved to a white convertible sports car driving along the road at a clip toward the water. The sight intrigued him. Once the chopper touched ground, he jumped down and started across the wooded area to the car park where it had just pulled to a stop.

To his surprise he saw a well-endowed brunette woman climb out and walk around the area with confidence, as if she were searching for someone. Closer now, he noticed she bore a superficial resemblance to the lovely longhaired teen of Theo’s youth.

Stella.

CHAPTER TWO

THE years had turned the only Athas daughter into a gorgeous female, whose classic white dress was cinched with a wide belt, highlighting curves above and below her slender waist. She’d always been beautiful to Theo, but having the baby had caused her to blossom.

Her high cheekbones, combined with the lovely contours of her face and glossy hair made her so striking, he couldn’t look anywhere else.

He’d wondered how much she might have changed. What he hadn’t expected was to feel his senses ignite by simply looking at her again. That wasn’t supposed to happen, not when she’d kept all knowledge of their child from him.

Another step and their eyes met. Those velvety brown eyes he remembered so well stared at him with a mixture of shock and anxiety. After what she’d done, she ought to be terrified of him. She seemed to weave for a minute before she wandered back to her car and held on to the frame as if needing support.

He strolled up to the other side of the car. Deciding they were too much of a target for any observers, he climbed in the passenger side and shut the door. She hesitated before following suit.

The second she sat behind the wheel, her fragrance reached out to him. Again he was stunned because it was the scent he would always associate with her. It took him back to the last time they were together. Everywhere he’d kissed her, she’d tasted delightful, like fresh flowers on a warm spring morning.

Right now it was the last thing he wanted to be reminded of, but trying to blot out certain intimate thoughts was like attempting to hold back a tidal wave.

He turned to her, sliding his arm across part of the seat. She’d averted her eyes. If he wasn’t mistaken, she was trembling. On some level it pleased him she wasn’t in total control.

“Thank you for meeting me, Stella.”

“You didn’t leave me a choice.” Her words came out jerkily.

“Actually, I did.”

“You’re talking about court. I can’t imagine anything more terrifying for Ari,” she cried, sounding desperate.

“Believe it or not, it frightens me even more. Too much time has been lost as it is.” It surprised him how much he wanted to reach out and touch her, to see if she was real. “You were always lovely before, but you’ve turned into a startlingly beautiful woman.”

If anything, her features hardened at the compliment.

His gaze drifted beyond her face. “Strange how this little secluded stretch of beach reminds me of—”

“Don’t.” Her profile looked chiseled. Apparently she’d had the same impression and didn’t want to travel down that road of remembered ecstasy. “I agreed to meet you so we could talk about the best way to help Ari deal with this situation.”

A situation that had been put in play six years ago and was never of his choosing, but he didn’t voice his thoughts. For the moment Theo was walking on eggshells. “Do you think he’d be more comfortable meeting in Athens than here?”

She kneaded her hands, drawing his attention to her beautifully manicured nails. He grimaced to realize every part of her body looked quite perfect to him. It was impossible to eye her dispassionately. “Ari won’t be comfortable anywhere with you, but since we’re staying on Andros for a while, it should probably take place here.”

“What have you told him about me?”

She sucked in her breath. “Very little.”

“Even so, could you spell that out for me?”

Suddenly she jerked her head in his direction. Those gorgeous brown eyes pierced his with laserlike intensity. “You mean the way you spelled it out for me?” she cried. Her hands had gripped the steering wheel with enough force he imagined she could bend it. “I told him the truth, that you didn’t love me after all, so we never saw each other again. That was all I knew to tell him. It’s all he knows.”

Theo studied her features. “Yet you left out half the story. It’s time he heard that you stopped loving me. I’m sure he has no idea that you never intended to come to the church and go away with me so we could be married and have our baby in peace.”